Abergeldie Castle – could it be saved from the Dee?

I’m not belittling anything. Certainly not anything of substance which you have yet to offer the argument.

Facts or GTFO

I fail to see the difference provided the money is spent locally

Good point, I’m sure there’s a load of building contractors on Deeside sitting about wondering where their next job is going to come from.

he does after all have plenty of assets, that is a fact and even nowadays banks are quite happy to lend money to people with assets.

I assume you’ve checked whether he has loans secured against those assets already?

Meanwhile the A93 is still closed. Maybe those rocks being dumped in the river would be better deployed half a mile upstream. Then the castle could get the trickle down effect.

It looks like we taxpayers might be providing more support than the cash sums described above…

500 soldiers were deployed in Yorkshire and Lancashire to help with the floods – not to mention all the firefighters, ambulance crews, police, rescue crews etc.

Or does that not count because they were sent to “normal” people?

Meanwhile the A93 is still closed.

I’m sure The Highways would be delighted to have some unknown contractor turn up and start dumping rocks. Cracking piece of “whataboutery”.

Oh, what do you mean by “nitpick” then?

squirrelking – Member

I presume the house would be considered an integral part of the estate and the shooting “experience” as opposed to a 21st century eco cottage. Yes, assumption but it’s about all anyone can manage around here.

squirrelking – Member

Facts or GTFO

Door’s just there.

edit. Can’t be arsed.

Latest on the A93:

The Invercauld Bridge on the A93 at Braemar remains closed to both vehicular and pedestrian traffic, following damage to the flood relief arch on the east of the structure.

A plan to repair the damage to the relief arch has been agreed and contractors began work today. It is expected the works will be complete in about a fortnight. For the meantime, vehicular access to Braemar will continue to be via the A93 from the south.

Following discussions with landowners and relevant agencies, the old Dee Bridge is now available to pedestrians, and is lit at night. Pedestrians are advised to take a torch and take additional care when using the bridge.

Emergency vehicles will be able to use the bridge as required, but there is no access to public vehicles.

• The A93 at Micras remains unpassable following the collapse of a large section of the road. Diversions are in place via the B979 South Deeside Road to the south, and via the A939 and B976 via Gairnshiel to the north.

Both routes are narrow in sections and extra care and time should be taken when using these routes.

Agreement has been reached with a local landowner to construct a temporary diversion at Micras, and it is hoped this will be in place within the next week to 10 days.

From the Daily Record

“Aberdeenshire Council confirmed contractors supported by their structural engineers were on site after funding of £100,000 was secured from Scottish Business in the Community”

I don’t see how anyone can really support a charitable donation of that scale to a single private ‘owner’ of a publically inaccessible estate.

To save a house of national importance would be fair enough if the public had any rights over it. But we don’t. So **** him.

If the laird can’t afford to fix it he can sell it to someone who can or raise money from his other assets. That’s what anyone else would have to do.

If the issue is saving a listed building and that means that the public purse should be stepping in to save it, then perhaps listing a building should mean that the public have a quantifiable stake in a listed property.

This charitable donation does seem to be stretching the remit of the charity somewhat.

Another thing:

I doubt anyone donating to a body called “Scottish Business in the Community” would really expect the target businesses to be lords with enormous shooting estates. I would expect they would have in mind twee little bakeries and nurseries and other mundane stuff which actually needs support to get off the ground. Cronyism at its finest I think.

He’s not a Lord, he’s a Baron; a title which is attached to the house (not the estate since we ended feudalism about ten years ago) rather than the person, it can be bought and sold to anyone. Again, don’t let facts get in the way of a good froth.

Northwind – I was open about the fact I was speculating, others however seem to be quite happy passing off their speculation as fact. That’s my problem, nobody has brought anything factual to the table, I’m just trying to balance things off a bit.

#edinburghdefence, Junkyard in 5,4,3…

I hope it doesn’t get washed away. Its a 16th century castle, of historical significance, in a beautiful part of the country.

£100, 000 seems like a worthwhile investment to stop it collapsing. If the charity is happy and able to help, great. I don’t give a hoot if I’m not allowed to visit it.

Ah, now we get to the nub of it – if the castle falls down does he stop being a baron?

Northwind – I was open about the fact I was speculating, others however seem to be quite happy passing off their speculation as fact.

Presumably you’re going to provide a quote where somebody makes such a claim?

We’re all speculating here – that’s the nature of most of the discussions on STW where we don’t have access to anything other than media articles. Yet you seem to be the one who’s introduced that as an issue in this discussion, complaining about other people not having facts despite having none yourself – such an argument appears to have the aim simply of shutting up other people and ignoring their points (you can make it if you want, but you look a bit daft). Sure we’re speculating, speculating based upon reasonable assumptions – and we do have the fact of £100k funding compared to £500 for the plebs.

Lord, baron, whatever. The point is he’s hardly in a position where, even with the loss of his house, he’d be standing in the queue at the jobcentre once a week.

But of course, here on the internet (or more particularly STW), using the wrong word means everything you have ever said and will ever say is entirely incorrect and untrustworthy in perpetuity.

He has enough by way of cash, assets and influence to sort his own problems out. If he wants his problems to be our problems then he should be handing over some stake to his assets.

You’re assuming the best of intentions on his part, I’m assuming the worst. Meh.

He has enough by way of cash, assets and influence to sort his own problems out

How do you think that’s working out then?

and we do have the fact of £100k funding compared to £500 for the plebs

and the fact of owning a shooting estate on Deeside with a castle and baronial title. Hardly the stuff of Breadline Britain, is it?

Tinybits – that does seem to be going quite well. It would have been nice if he’d used it to secure some sort of non-charitably funded help though eh.

How do you think that’s working out then?

£100k backhander from “charity”, army on hand doing remedial work – I’d say it looks like it’s working out not too bad.

speculating based upon reasonable assumptions

You say reasonable assumptions, I’d say idle prejudice.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-35242529

we do have the fact of £100k funding compared to £500 for the plebs.

Is that all it costs to repair burst banks and divert rivers away from pleb houses? £500?

Wow. No wonder people are complaining that the Environment Agency aren’t doing enough – I was under the impression that billions of pounds had been spent protecting pleb houses.

Which particular assumptions of mine do you think are idle prejudice? Just wondering what facts you’re basing that statement on…

All about how you see the £100k isn’t it:

1) To protect a building 400 years old of cultural significance or

2) Money thrown at a rich old tw*t

To put the money into perspective Aberdeen council spent somewhere between £60-80 Million on the redevelopment of Marischal College 😯

The difference is that spending £x million pounds on flood defences for a town or community benefits everyone equally. It prevents transport links from vanishing and ensures that the town business don’t suffer undue disruption and fail.

Our baron mate here “benefits” from flood defences up and downstream same as everyone in the nearby area.

This is £100,000 to protect one private residence, culturally significant or not don’t pretend its the same thing.

It’s normal for the owners of buildings of cultural significance to pay for stuff to stop them falling down – that’s the cost of living in such a place. Arguably for a listed building the council could have stepped in and done the work required and then charged him for it – though doubtless that would have required lengthy court proceedings.

I’m not sure what the relevance is of the amount spent on a building which is effectively publicly owned.

This is £100,000 to protect one private residence, culturally significant or not don’t pretend its the same thing.

You’re right. It’s absolutely not the same thing, because the billions spent on flood defences and restoration work for “pleb” houses comes from the public purse.

Whereas the £100,000 this guy has been given/lent/granted is private money from a charity that specifically aims to help “businesses, of all sizes and in all sectors, to operate more sustainably and responsibly to improve the economic, social and environmental outcomes for Scotland”.

You’re right. It’s absolutely not the same thing, because the billions spent on flood defences and restoration work for “pleb” houses comes from the public purse.

The EA apply a fairly ruthless cost / benefit analysis for flood defences. Your pleb house only gets protection if it meets nationally agreed criteria. How a charity managed to do this in a day just after the New Year break is just amazing.

Controversially the best thing economically would be to let it fall down. The clean up and construction of new sustainable dwelling would a be a boon for the local area.

Whereas the £100,000 this guy has been given/lent/granted is private money

You know for a fact that all their income comes from private sources and not as grants from taxation/lottery money?

The EA apply a fairly ruthless cost / benefit analysis for flood defences. Your pleb house only gets protection if it meets nationally agreed criteria

Criteria which includes “Historical environment: No. of Scheduled Ancient Monuments and listed buildings affected” (from Table 6.4 of “Evaluating a multi-criteria analysis (MCA) methodology for application to flood management and coastal defence appraisals”)

Abergeldie is a Grade A listed building:
http://portal.historic-scotland.gov.uk/designation/LB3005

I wonder if tipping some big rocks and small rocks in the river is part of a properly scoped engineering plan? Looks a bit knee jerky to me.

Which is an interesting point of discussion – though one I think we’ve already done, the question being whether helping to preserve a private dwelling correctly comes under the aims of a charity which purports to help business (charities can’t do whatever they like – this one also gets public funding – that’s a fact BTW). From their “about”:

We form a vital bridge to help make the right difference in communities all over the country by:

Helping to tackle poverty and getting vulnerable, disadvantaged people into work – and back on their feet.
Working with children and young people to gain skills and have aspirations that can change the course of their lives.
Making workplaces fairer, more productive and more sustainable.
Improving our civic spaces through harnessing the effort, expertise and commitment of Scotland’s workforce.

Which of those aims do you think this comes under?

Though it doesn’t directly address the question of the amount of money being spent on protecting a single residence, compared to the amount spent on protecting thousands of residences.

Well to be fair, it might not be a long term solution, but right now they just need a short term solution and I suspect that’s a method which has a sound engineering basis in that it’s worked before. Simple methods are sometimes quite effective and they’ve probably not had time yet to go through a complete engineering design cycle.

You know for a fact that all their income comes from private sources and not as grants from taxation/lottery money?

Some of each if you look at their website (not too dislike most charities / companies).

NB: Lottery money shouldn’t be lumped with taxation, it up to you whether you want to play the lottery and it is run by a private company.

Which of those aims do you think this comes under?

I think it comes under the one on their About SBC[/url] page that I quoted:
“SBC’s vision for businesses, of all sizes and in all sectors, to operate more sustainably and responsibly to improve the economic, social and environmental outcomes for Scotland”

I freely admit it seems a bit of a stretch, but losing a 450-year old listed building is certainly a bad social outcome.

Depending how it would affect estate business it may well be a bad economic outcome too.

Ultimately none of us know any real details of the deal the charity did with the estate – but it’s their money and they have their own board and members to answer to.

Though it doesn’t directly address the question of the amount of money being spent on protecting a single residence, compared to the amount spent on protecting thousands of residences.

Well according to this BBC article Cameron says “We are going to spend £2.3bn on flood defences in this parliament”.

I dare say that mobilising the fire service, police, army, ambulance crews, emergency road repairs etc etc has cost a pretty penny too.

I suspect 100k would be a drop in the ocean, even if it had come from the same purse. Which it didn’t.

Some of each if you look at their website (not too dislike most charities / companies).

Yep, I did. Just wondering if the other poster bothered 🙂

NB: Lottery money shouldn’t be lumped with taxation, it up to you whether you want to play the lottery and it is run by a private company.

Whoever runs the lottery doesn’t just get to distribute the money wherever they like though – it’s up to the government to set policy in that regard. So IMO it is very much of public interest if that money were ever mis-used.

GrahamS that’s all fair enough then.

My interpretation of this

businesses, of all sizes and in all sectors, to operate more sustainably and responsibly to improve the economic, social and environmental outcomes for Scotland

wouldn’t fit here though.

In fairness it seems so loosely worded that the trustees can do whatever the **** they want so long as its in Scotland.

Whether its the best use of the money is another question, as is whether or not it would be made available so quickly to someone in a less prominent position is another.

As I said before, if someone was rattling a bucket for this charity, the name of the charity would suggest a different use of the money and I am fairly sure that if you asked them, different examples would be given.